


On Letting Go

by agenderleadingplayer



Category: Spring Awakening - Sheik/Sater
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, M/M, One Shot, no happy ending this time guys sorry
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-30
Updated: 2015-12-30
Packaged: 2018-05-10 11:21:26
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,838
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5583922
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/agenderleadingplayer/pseuds/agenderleadingplayer
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Based off the poem "Honest Confessions on Letting Go" by Kevin Kantor.</p>
<p>Hanschen looks back on a relationship that wasn't really there to begin with.</p>
            </blockquote>





	On Letting Go

_Honest confessions on falling in and out of love with a confused, twenty-something, semi-closeted gay man or, I can usually tell in the first fifteen minutes if something’s gonna work out for the long haul, so why did I ever bother, or, a beginner’s guide to crying publicly at parties over a completely self-fabricated history of something that only ever sort of was! Or: how to let go._ _  
_

***

_One._

The party is loud, too loud. Everyone’s dressed up as something-or-other, and you’re standing awkwardly in the corner in your terrible, half-assed cowboy costume sipping on the spiked punch like you're too good for everyone else. (Which, let's face it, you totally are.)

Ilse is stumbling around like a maniac, her appearance not improved by her store-bought Dora the Explorer costume, kicking back shot after shot. The music’s too loud but she keeps telling Melchior to turn it up louder, even though everyone knows that it's not his party and not even his house. Even so, Melchior now seems to have a permanent residence by the stereo.

Someone walks down the stairs and it's someone you swear you've never seen before, which is crazy considering you know every person who’s ever been to Georg’s house, especially his Halloween parties. But you can't be mistaken, you've never seen the boy. He's cute: tall and kind of endearingly lanky, with dark feathered hair. If you didn't despise the word, you might call him adorable. He seems just as drunk as everyone else, losing his footing at some points on his journey down the basement steps. Just drunk enough to flirt with, you figure.

And then everyone’s eyes are back on Ilse as she drunkenly pulls the folding chair from a desk in the corner, dragging it into the middle of the room. This behavior has grown to be expected at these parties the past few years, but you can't remember a time when she’s been this out of it. How many shots had she even had?

Ilse stands up on the chair, nearly falling down at least three times. “How many shots has Dora had?” she slurs, arms waving around wildly, clutching a bottle of cheap vodka in her left hand, an electric blue shot glass in her right. She waits for a response, which no one gives, so she answers her own question: “OCHO! DORA TIENE OCHO SHOTS!” This is met by a cheer from Otto and an eyeroll from Wendla, and a look of utter shock and disbelief on the face of the new boy (the boy whose name, you will later find out, is Ernst).

Five minutes later, you’re snapped out of your second bout of antisocial wallowing by cheers from everyone, and now you're watching dumbfounded as Drunk Ernst makes out with Even Drunk-er Dora in the middle of the basement.

So it's settled, then.

You're getting that boy.

***

_Two._

“You have to _promise_ me you won't watch the movie without me, Hanschen. It's for our first real date, and I can't have that ruined. Can you do that?”

You sigh playfully, give Ernst a peck on the cheek. “Of course. I can wait two weeks. It's not that long.”

He laughs. “Good. Have fun at your mom’s, okay?”

You nod. “Yeah. You have fun at home too. And –” He had turned to leave but you stop him. “Happy first winter break of college.”

“Thanks.” He gives you a quick kiss on the lips, then rushes out the door.

The next day you open your laptop first thing and watch the entirety of _Django Unchained_. It’s not that good. You pretend to be watching it the first time on your date with him, feel kind of guilty about it, too.

You swear that you won't do it again, and keep that promise remarkably well; that's the only time you ever lie to him, which, for you, is a personal best.

***

_Three._

The ice is slippery, and the thought occurs at the back of your mind that you should have brought a jacket. But Ernst is holding your hand, so it's not that bad. He’s stumbling and falling all over the rink, and, honestly, it's kind of incredibly sexy. Even more so is his knowledge of the topic at hand:

“He had a career that lasted less than fifteen years! And in that time, do you know what he did? He completed forty feature-length films, two television film series, three short films, four video productions, twenty-four stage plays, _and_ four radio plays; and that's not even _counting_ the acting work he did! Isn't that incredible?” He looks at you, and, frankly, you couldn't care less about Rainer Werner Fassbinder, but considering Ernst looks _so fucking good_ telling you about him, with his hair all in his face…

The moment is broken when Ernst completely topples over, taking you with him. You’re both laughing on the surface of the ice now, struggling to stand up.

You both manage to get on your feet and you turn to face him, shove him playfully, just soft enough that he falters (still unbelievably cute) but doesn't fall. “It's not hard. You just have to balance, and glide.” You show him, taking two strides, then coming to a stop.

He awkwardly makes his way up to you, shoves you back. “You know full well it's not that fucking easy,” he says. His voice sounds angry, but he’s smiling, and now you get the feeling you don't really need a jacket anymore, not with how pathetically warm this boy is making you feel inside.

*** _  
_ _Four._

He’s an artist; you can tell that from the way his stuff is strewn all over the place. That, and the myriad of supplies covering every inch of his kitchen table.

“So you...paint?” you guess, picking up a paintbrush and twirling it in your fingers. It's still wet, you find out too late.

“Yeah! Do you wanna see…?” You follow him into his studio, and everything is…everywhere. Everything is everywhere, there's no other way to describe it.

That night you have a dream that you're deep-cleaning the entire goddamn apartment. You dream the same thing the next night. And the next. And the next…

*** _  
_ _Five._

“Wait!” He grabs you by your shirt sleeve and you find yourself with one foot in his bedroom, one foot out.

“I thought I was staying the night…?” You must look incredibly confused.

“Yeah, I know, it's just my roommate...well, I suppose you know him, um. Otto might...I mean, well, he doesn't really know that I'm…” He gestures quickly at the (very small) space between the two of you.

“Dating me?” He shakes his head. “...Gay?” Ernst nods sharply, looking down at his feet. You don't have the nerve to tell him that Otto probably figured that out the day they moved in.

You should have left him then, you'll think, looking back on this. Not because of selfishness; not because you're mad; just because when you begin to rearrange your vocabulary for someone else, replacing words like “unhealthy”, for example, with words like “compromise”, sometimes you can forget your own name.

*** _  
_ _Six._

“Come on, babe,” he says, and it’s the first time he’s ever called you that.

To him, it’s as simple as turning on a light switch: something quick and easy he knows he can do to brighten up the room.

But now the two of you are sleeping with the lights on because he’s afraid of the monster in his closet. And you’re afraid that maybe it’s already climbed into the bed with you.

Or that you had been the monster all along.

*** _  
_ _Seven._

The sex was amazing. You don't tell anybody that, of course.

*** _  
_ _Eight._

Sometimes, you think about him during sex with other people.

You don't mean to.

That's a lie.

Sometimes you mean to.

*** _  
_ _Nine._

Some days, after it’s all over, you want him to hurt. You want him to hurt so much.

Other days, you think of him and you hope, you _pray_ he’s happy. On those days, you need him to be.

And still other days you wish both. And at first you weren’t sure how you wished both, and now you’re still not sure how you wish both, but you do. You’ve never wanted this much for anyone. _  
_

*** _  
_ _Ten._

It’s one of those days where nothing is going right, and you’re fighting and fighting and _fighting_ and maybe it was your fault all along; when you look back you can’t remember. All you remember is this:

“Don’t you get it, Ernst? I love you!”

It’s quiet. You’d yelled it, you’d been mad. You’d told him you love him.

Last resort.

Like it was going to save you. Like it was a bomb shelter, to hide in after it all went to shit.

But you would always be hungrier than your rations would allow.

*** _  
_ _Eleven._

He’d taught you to look at a seed and see a flower.

How do you tell someone that?

He’d taught you to look at a seed and see a flower, and now _he’s_ the flower, blooming in some other man’s garden, but you feel like you’re the only one who got his hands dirty.

When he bites into Ernst’s roots ‒ _his Ernst’s_ roots ‒ your rainwater will be the only thing he’ll taste, whoever _he_ is now.

He’ll look at _his Ernst_ and say, “How beautiful…”

*** _  
_ _Twelve._

Sometimes, when you think of him, you realize you still haven’t forgotten how to find him beautiful. _  
_

*** _  
_ _Thirteen._

You’re trying. _  
_

*** _  
_ _Fourteen._

He’s smiling like an idiot when you open your apartment door for him. He’s got a gold metallic gift bag in his hand, a bouquet of white and pink roses in the other. You feel foolish for a moment, having bought him red ones.

“Happy Valentine’s Day!” he says, hugging you tight. He seems way too excited to be giving you whatever the hell is in that bag. When he pulls back from the hug, he thrusts the bouquet at you, which you place on the kitchen table, then hands the bag over.

You take the present gingerly, wondering what could be so important that Ernst is practically jumping up and down when he gives it to you. You open it and find…

Well, truthfully you don’t know what it is at first. It’s silver, and covered with cute little messages written in black Sharpie, but you don’t know what it is. You give a confused look to Ernst.

“It’s an eggplant!”

“A...an eggplant?”

He explains it to you then: he’d covered the entire thing in silver Sharpie so he could write the cute messages on it in black, which wouldn’t show up on the purple. You don’t tell him that he could have just written the messages in silver all along, how now that it’s all colored over you hadn’t known what it was, because, well…eggplants are purple.

_You covered up everything to try to be with me, an_ _d I no longer knew what I was._

**Author's Note:**

> the poem is on youtube; it's one of my favorites i really recommend you all watch it!
> 
> just a note: all the fun, metaphor-y parts were most likely not written by me, but by the original poet (another reason to watch the video) and the italicized parts at the beginning and end were also taken directly from the poem.
> 
> please comment if you enjoyed!! my ego would appreciate it lmao


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